


they misread human nature, my love.

by arrows



Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Apocalypse, F/M, i hecked up i hecked up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-21
Updated: 2013-09-21
Packaged: 2017-12-27 04:46:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/974502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arrows/pseuds/arrows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mortals have always just been a thin slice of paper blowing on a rock around the universe, and this isn't rock-paper-scissors. They can't conquer the earth, as much as they try. They'll only be ripped in half and shredded.</p>
<p>Of course, the two mages standing on a mountain watching the world burn are not paper. They're no longer that flammable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	they misread human nature, my love.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired largely by [this poem](http://rrevolutionaries.tumblr.com/post/44711017777/) (also the source of the title), [this mix](http://8tracks.com/amare/strike-me-down), [and this post](http://thymoss.tumblr.com/post/58442906630/made-rebloggable-by-request-man-anon-ive-been).
> 
> (skeleton committee, if you're reading this: i'm so sorry i hecked up i hecked up)

It's the end of the world and they will not save it this time.

It's been long enough that both have lost track of how many times they've saved the country, the world, the universe -- it blurs together. They're no longer the salvation of mortals. Instead, they've become the destroyers, and as humanity crumbles around them, they watch them realize how hopeless they had been all along. People have always just been a thin slice of paper blowing on a rock around the universe, and this isn't rock-paper-scissors. They can't conquer the earth, as much as they try. They'll only be ripped in half and shredded.

Of course, the two mages standing on a mountain watching the world burn are not paper. They're no longer that flammable.

"I feel like I should miss it," the girl says. Her dark hair blows with the smoke from endless towns on fire. "But I don't. There's nothing left to miss now, anyways, is there?" Her family had died ages ago, and at that point she hadn't seen them in decades anyways. She wonders what kind of life her sister had. Normal, probably. Maybe she'd been a teacher or an artist. No use contemplating now.

The man in the armor only nods, staring straight ahead. 

They're the rulers of the world now, though it was never announced. The pair of them stood above, just out of reach of flaming cities; royalty, the last ones left.

The miracle of an apocalypse, all the wonderful _death_ rushing towards her, is beyond everything. Darquesse feels her lips spread into a vicious smile. The ultimate free will of being the last ones left. Sure, there's the ones who went out to Mars a few years back, but they're only mortal. They'll die soon enough without help from Earth.

She leaned over and pressed a kiss to the side of his armor. The metal was cold under her lips and she lingered, tasted the darkness.

Incredible.

She pulls back suddenly and launches into the air, off the side of the cliff and sweeping down. A laugh, a scream, they sound the same.

The fire touches her face and she lets it sit there, not healing it until she can feel the burning. She can't see or breathe through the smoke, but does it matter? She's having far too much fun to care about a small detail like that.

She dives down and back up, glides inches from the side of the mountain until she reaches Vile. In the few seconds it takes her to get there, she realizes something: there's nothing left to destroy.

Upon reaching him, she realizes another thing. She can still break him. She wants to make him break his annoyingly constant silence. She'll destroy him and put him back together.

She flies behind him and immediately begins tearing his armor away with shadows, not giving it times to heal back over. In both war and something sort of akin to love, she liked things messy. She could feel bone against her hands, and his own cloud of darkness turning sharp and spearing into her skin.

She smiled. Kissed his teeth, felt her fingers run down his ribs. Her eyes closed tight, she healed her wounds as she went, and he seemed to relax. At least, he wasn't throwing shadowed spears at her anymore. She pulled back and opened her eyes, grinning. He pulled her back, grabbing her hair and they fly into the air together.

As the world below them burnt like a firecracker, they rose from the ashes. The darkness was lit by the flames under their bloodstained hands, but they also had each other under those hands and that was more important than a dead planet.

As the last two people alive -- the cause of the apocalypse -- they don't even stop to watch the world fall.


End file.
